


a moment

by exactlyright



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Student/Teacher, Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Chaptered, Coping, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Moving On, Not until after though maybe, Past Abuse, Past Joffrey Baratheon/Sansa Stark, Past Relationship(s), Professor Sansa/Student Sandor, Sandor gets a puppy, Service Dogs, Slow Burn, Trauma, University AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-02
Updated: 2017-11-12
Packaged: 2018-12-23 02:14:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 14,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11979933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/exactlyright/pseuds/exactlyright
Summary: sansa needs moments. she needs time. and maybe he can start to give her that.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Modern AU with professor Sansa and student Sandor.

There was a moment she took before the beginning of every semester. A day of reflection and solitude. She had grown, and she was growing and her students would grow with her. 

Her parents were still shocked she went into this. Teaching was not her forte as a teenager, and history held little to no interest to her besides stories of knights and damsels as a child. 

A random required art history credit with a professor who loved the Middle Ages and brought back the stories from Sansa’s childhood with a new light, one which showed depth and spirit, and humankind’s need to create and relate even during the darkest times had Sansa switching from a fashion business major to history by the end of the first semester. 

It took her 10 years to get her PhD. A semester off after Joffrey. A semester off and a new university after Professor Baelish. A specialization in medieval history, and a dissertation on the Winter Queen, a nameless woman who history and men decided was unimportant, but whose steady dedication to her people and the North alive through the longest recorded winter saw her graduating in the summer, with an intimate graduating class and her family taking an entire row in the audience. 

Her dedication and passion, however, mattered little in a world with a large number of history graduates and a larger population of professors who were too busy enjoying tenure to retire. An adjunct professor at a community college was not her dreams, but she had access to multiple databases of research and she could be happy with that. 

This semester she was teaching 4 classes, more than she had any other semester, and the Dean had mentioned a need for a new assistant professor. She could not do badly this semester. 4 basic history courses, which had been in her teaching rotation since she was a TA during graduate school would be easy, she told herself. They had to be. Teach some basics until she could move up, and begin teaching the more advanced classes. Do not think of Baelish’s breath as he suggested how he could improve her situation. Do not think of Joffrey’s interest in medieval weaponry, and how the iron still seemed to have more bite than in other eras. 

She shook herself out of her thoughts. Her day before classes was never busy. She didn’t see anyone on these days. She left her office, and mentioned nothing to her family. 

Today she went hiking. It was still too cold for many people. The late January ice was melting into early February snow. Sansa had been raised in the North, had only ever left it for Ivy league colleges, only to return frozen by the Summer Land’s people. The North was more than her home, but was in her very soul. The cold of winters, more regular now than ever in the past, felt like taking a breath of home with every step. 

Her dog, Lady, relished the cold too. Her service dog vest kept her bright against the landscape. Bright enough that another dog saw her, and took her for a wolf. After growling for what felt like hours, with Sansa quickly spiraling behind the two, a man appeared, grabbing the stray dog and hushing it until it relaxed, with Lady quickly turning her attention back to her owner. Lady’s paws against Sansa’s chest and licks to the face got Sansa to focus less on the memory of a man she could not name. The man who saved her was now pointedly not staring, simply standing watch. He was tall. His hair was long, and she wondered, as she did with all men, if she had known him before whether he would have helped with the hurting or if he would have been strong enough to stop it. She wondered what he considered abuse. Words or hits? 

He could be a hitter. There was no way to see anything but a vague outline of a body in true northern clothes, but he seemed strong. It was in the way he carried himself. Men carried themselves differently when they were strong, when strength was more nature than logic. 

But after she stared for longer than a minute, his posture changed to almost insecure. As if being seen did not come naturally to him. As if strength was something he was used to being enough to get people to not look. 

“Can you walk?” The gruff voice was not what shocked her, and his head finally facing her straight on did not scare her, but made her more relaxed. There was a shame that came with scars. A shame when she was younger would have made her frightened, made her not look him in the eyes. But she understood now. Understood the scars, and the burdens that come with them. She nodded, and got up off the ground she didn’t remember falling into. 

They backtracked through the trail in silence, the stray now following closely at the man’s heels. She tried to make conversation, a life training in courtesies does not disappear with a few bad years, but he would have none of it. Grunts were the most she got in response to any of her questions. Even his name was apparently meant to be a secret from her.

“He seems to like you.” she said in what she had determined to be her last and final effort. 

“He’s a dog, they can’t not like somebody.” He sounded careless, but he rubbed the dog’s head when he walked by. 

“I know a vet clinic near here. They could give him his shots. You could take him home.” His next bout of silence seemed more thoughtful than annoyed, and Sansa could consider that a success. 

When they get to their cars, he asks her for the vet clinic’s information and if they were open for the next few hours in the most gentle voice she thought he could have. She wrote it on his hand with a dying pen, and he didn’t say thank you, but she did have to almost scratch the address into him, so she understood. 

-

The next day began her marathon day. An 8 am which had too many freshmen in it, a 10 am which threatened complete silence for an entire semester had her dreaming of advanced classes and research and how nice it would feel to have a student actually respond when she said a question. The next class she taught was a night class. Longer than most, an hour and a half rather than 50 minutes, it was a new class style the college was trying to prevent students from having to come on Fridays. 

It was meant for people with jobs, as most night classes were, so when 7 came around and there were no people she understood and she waited. And waited. At 7:24 she was on her way to writing a rather snarky email to the class that Lady nudged the syllabus out from beneath the attendance sheet and picking it up realized she had listed the wrong classroom.

Quickly moving to the second floor instead of the first and shaming herself she walked into a group of annoyed adults who were standing outside what they believed to be their class. An Associate Professor from the Art History section of her department was arguing with a student whose low baritone did not prevent him from projecting his voice throughout the hallway as he swore he did not break the door handle he was just trying to get into the fucking classroom. 

One by one she stopped, and quickly gave them the correct room number, urging them away from the scene. They largely ignored her, but as she got closer she prayed that they hadn’t for their own sakes. The man from the hiking trail was very different under bright lights. His scar was more prominent, but so was his jawline. He was wearing less layers this time, giving her hints that the bulk she had assumed was clothes was likely muscles. He was strength. 

The Art Hist professor saw Sansa from the side and instantly went for attack, “Stark, one of your students seems to have an issue with not only me, but this door. Take care of it.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, here goes. I guess this is officially my first chapter length fanfiction. this chapter is more setting up the situation, and overall kind of slow, but i hope you enjoy all the same!

“I didn’t break the fucking door. She just started yelling at me.” His words don’t fix the fact that there is a door knob in his hands, and not attached to the door. It does not help that the janitor is off in this building. She takes the knob and makes a note of the room number. Their fingers brush as she grabs it, and she wonders if she should’ve asked before reaching for it. 

He seems genuinely uncomfortable, and almost guilty. He attempts to run his fingers through his hair, but gets caught in the messy coil of the bun and stops. “So you’re the professor, huh?” 

The way he says it doesn’t surprise her. She’s younger than most of this class, and young even for a professor. She has faced people doubting her before. 

“It’s time for class.” Her smile feels sick to her, like when she put too much honey on her muffin, and if possible he looks more uncomfortable, but this time she relishes it. Let him doubt her, he will finish the class knowing more about history than he thought possible, and she will be enough. 

As she is walking away she hears him trying to get into the wrong classroom again, before another man stops him. “This isn’t the right classroom. Follow her.” 

She feels guilty for a moment, had got too caught up in her anger to focus on telling basic information. Then she realizes class is now 45 minutes past it’s listed start time, and she forces herself to focus. 

There are now people in the classroom she left, all looking agitated. She keeps the honey smile on her face as she greets them, preparing for being on the receiving end of even more of their frustration when she tells them that she can’t afford to not teach on syllabus day, and that she’ll be lecturing for the full time. 

The man does not sit in the back like she expects, but in the middle, below the projector. He is still looking at her. They all are. Lady stares back, then goes to lay underneath her desk. 

She begins with her name, and asking who has bought the book. The silence that fills the room is deafening. 

-

Once class is finished she is longing for warm water with honey, and makes a note to buy dinner beforehand in the future. She is not done, however, and as she is logging out of the faculty computer she is descended on by students. 

Do I really need the book? Are the tests multiple choice? Why is there a response paper due in the first month of classes? What if they don’t order the book on time? Why are there only 3 absences allowed under university policy? 

She wonders how many times she can answer “If you’ll look in your syllabus, you will find your answer” before a student actually looks at their syllabus. An hour of printing and stapling, and 4 hours of reviewing every section put to waste by students who prefer wasting her time in person instead. 

She is excited though. A class with questions always goes better and easier than a class with none. She finds herself glancing in Clegane, Sandor’s spot to gauge his reaction. The spot is empty, and she tries to ignore why that would bother her as she is asked for her email yet again. 

As the class empties, she emails maintenance to tell them about the door, but finds herself keeping the door handle. It isn’t warm, just a typical metal handle, but she keeps it anyways, trying to hold it in the same way she was when their fingers touched. 

Catching herself, she throws it in her bag hastily, and locks the classroom. 

-

The next few weeks consist of her finding her routine, and trying to keep track of students. All of her students. Clegane, Sandor is still enrolled in her night class, but refuses to comment on anything. She can tell he wants to. She realizes after the first response paper that he knows his stuff, including references and sources far past what his classmates did. 

But he refuses to say a word. Even when she still took role in the first week, he barely even said here, simply raised his hand. Amidst students who ask her questions with the answers on the slides, she mentally begs him to make a comment. 

Once she misstated a fact, and immediately felt him tense up. She waited for somebody to comment, knowing that only he would notice, and ends up correcting herself to her eternal shame. 

Another time she directly asks him a question under the guise of trying to get classroom participation, but before he finished glaring at her, somebody in the front shouted the answer. 

She gives up on trying to get him to talk in favor of creating their first test. It is never too hard, but does consist of essay questions, something all of her students seem to struggle with, despite the fact that it is an online test, and therefore open book and open notes. 

The first test was always online, not only because she didn’t have enough time in any of her classes to lose a day to a test, but also because she knew that most students would need a grade boost at some point, and a test like this was a pretty good grade boost. It also tended to boost student’s moods and motivations, their good grades creating a sense of confidence she wasn’t sure would last but hoped would. 

She made sure to be in her office extra on test day, sending out an email to all her classes (teaching the same classes meant she got to keep them on the same schedule) reminding them of both the test, and the essay prompts. It was an hour after this that she got Sandor bursting into her office, and a notification that he failed the test.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> that's it for now. p.s idk if Sandor being good at history is ooc, but he's so smart in canon that I can't imagine him not being really good at something if it caught his interest and i feel like history is definitely something that could do that.


	3. Chapter 3

“My fucking wifi went out, the test submitted fucking empty.” She wondered if he ever got tired of using inappropriate language at any opportunity, and realized Arya would probably admire his determination. 

“There’s still 3 more tests in the class, this one counted for less than 16% of your final grade. If you wanted, we could try to find a time to reschedule your test. I’d have to be there though.” She was trying to be reassuring, but him being in her small for her office made her aware of the sheer amount of space he took up. She could feel Lady pressing against her leg. 

He seemed to collapse inward, and sat down in the single chair she had for guests and she was struck again by how uncomfortable he looked. He seemed to exist in a stressed space, like he was aware of how much he took up and wasn’t at the same time. His hands grasped onto his hair, which for once wasn’t up even in a loose ponytail. His hands moved downwards into his eyes, his palms pushing in as if he was trying to repress all emotion and frustration back into his corneas. 

“It’s really okay, I promise, you can retake the test, we’ll find a time, okay?” He was a statue, a breathing statue, a breathing statue whose deep breath seemed to suck all the oxygen out of the room. 

Still not looking at her, “I own a business, I don’t have free time. The only time I’ve cleared during the week is this class.” Sansa could feel his misery. He loved history, possibly as much as she did, and his resolved failure was a shockingly familiar image. 

“What about weekends?” Her question was out before she could resolve herself further, Arya’s love for the underdog spurring her on. 

The look he gave her should’ve been frightening. It was the same one as when she called on him to answer a question regarding the chapter, but it seemed less annoyed now, more challenging. The light reflected differently in his eyes this time, and his mouth seemed more like a straight line than a frown. She rushed to recover, “I come in every Saturday to do research anyways. It would take a while for me to contact the online office about reopening your test anyways. It makes sense.” 

It didn’t. If his test wouldn’t open or malfunctioned the office would be closed for the weekend, and she would have to request access a specific time slot, and spend that entire time with him. But he looked so disheartened and she didn’t know strength could look that soft, and Arya had been visiting and her stories of helping inner city kids who refused to take tests and listen to her must’ve been getting to her more than she thought. 

“I can come by at 8. Take it then.” She almost didn’t catch it.

“8 in the morning or 8 at night?” 

“The morning, why in the world would I want to take a test at 8 at fuckin night?” She mourned her sleep schedule yet again, but he was sitting straighter now, focused more on the chance to fix the mistake. His words seemed to have less bite now, and she wondered if it was her adjusting to him or something else.

“I’ll be here. You have to use a university monitored computer, but don’t forget your notes or mock essays. I’ll email you the location of the lab when I get access, and we can meet there.” She ignored the feeling in her stomach that felt close to giddiness, and noticed that his eyes seemed to finally be looking at her. There was a moment then. The air felt still and she realized she had begun to lean forward, and noticed that on the side of his face that was unscarred there were light freckles. She wondered if he was breathing as softly as she was.

And then his gaze turned towards his bag, and he nodded, and began to stand up. “Thanks, Professor Stark.”

“Sansa.” She was never strict in what she was addressed as, but in that moment she felt as if hearing him say her first name would be the equivalent of the world lighting up. He instead nodded, and left. 

She was filled with a sense of both shame and confusion. She was being inappropriate on so many levels. There was nothing legally wrong with what she was doing, and he was definitely of age, but he was still her student and he was still a man. Men hurt people. They hurt her. 

-

There was a moment where she thought of herself as a wolf. She was strong and her family was as well, their ancient family sigil a proud fact in all of them. Powerful and steady, just like the mythical Great Ice Wall, they would always be there for her. 

Until they weren't. When she began college, and began dating Joffrey they made their displeasure with him clear immediately. A moment, a pinnacle, pinnacle moment saw them insisting on her ending things with him when they saw the bruises. Saw her running away to be with her prince. Saw her trapped in his cycle and his mansion, too afraid to leave, but too afraid to stay. 

An abuser isolates people, makes them afraid of shadows, makes them afraid to move. Joffrey was a very good abuser. 

\- 

Lady is now climbing onto her, her pill bottle in between teeth. Her hands shake as she opens it, but the memory fades with breaths. Her therapist told her that the act of breathing is the simplest act of the body, but when we focus on just breathing, it takes our full attention. 

\- 

Saturday sees a very fragile Sansa. The past week has been a challenge, both in terms of her anxiety and her classes. All 4 classes did marginally well, but there were still students wanting her to correct their grades for simple one point issues, complaining about the essay question, pulling her aside to tell her why exactly they missed the test. 

Lady is keeping closer again. Sansa’s therapist says that this does not mean her recovery is over, or failed, but Sansa has to keep herself from flinching every time a male student gets too close. 

Sandor is there before her, standing outside the door with two cups of coffee. He sets one of them on the main desk in the room before sitting at one of the computers. She wonders if he simply is being kind or wants a grade boost. She wonders if his reason for not touching her is based off of his own insecurities or him noticing the shift. 

She takes a sip and makes a face before courtesy forces her to check if he saw. His entire focus is on the screen, his fingers typing at a speed which shocks her. She’s grateful, and regrets her rudeness immensely. She knew on some level that he would drink black coffee, so she was prepared for bitterness. Instead she got whipped cream, and hazelnut and too many flavors burning her tongue. 

There were 2 hours for him to complete the test. It was a medium sized coffee. She could finish it through pure power of politeness, but she didn’t know if she could do it casually. She could down it, pretend to be extremely tired and in need of caffeine. She considered throwing it away, but the small metal cans meant he would be able to hear the sound of a full coffee cup slamming into it. Lightly placing it would be an option as well. 

The debate ended when he stood up an hour early, claiming he was done, the cup still very full and now less than lukewarm. She decided to carry it last minute, opting out of all options. He threw his empty cup away, the light ping a mockery to her. 

“You not like coffee?” She didn’t know what was more frustrating, the fact that she was apparently now so bad at courtesy she couldn’t begin a conversation or the fact that she hadn’t hidden it well enough. 

“It’s… not my favorite.” She tried to say it in the nicest way possible, the words quieting with every vowel. He was quiet for a moment, a constant with him.

“Have you had breakfast then?” She stared until he seemed to realize what he had implied, and apparently decided to stick with it. “I owe you. I know you didn’t have to come. I looked it up. Professors are only required to come during the week. It’s a good place.” 

She doesn’t know what she is doing, but she thinks she feels herself nodding, and she thinks she sees him stand a little straighter as he suggests she follow him in her car.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this fic is therapeutic for me. sansa is still struggling. This fic has angst, and will definitely have more mentions of abuse throughout, but as somebody who as endured abuse, i'm trying to handle it as well as i can.


	4. Chapter 4

She had been to the diner before. Arya took her under the guise of meeting one of the cooks, Hot Pie. She had really just needed to get out of the house, but Hot Pie gave her no strange looks, simply served her a larger plate of eggs than she expected and kept her cup of orange juice full. 

They arrive in the midst of the Saturday brunch rush, have to awkwardly stand and wait for a table to open up. Neither one of them says anything, but her elbow brushes against his forearm once. 

A child who is waiting on the booths across from them goes to pet Lady, and as she stops the kid from interfering, trying to explain that Lady is working, she can feel his eyes on her. The tears come first from the child, with the yelling of the parents followed soon after. Sansa is very quickly reminded of why she doesn’t eat out. Then there is a gruff voice from behind her telling the parent to watch their kid, and then some much less nicer things, before a hostess interferes and suggests in a firm voice that both Sandor and the parent be quiet before they’re escorted out. After a few minutes of relative quiet, Sansa is able to move again. 

“ ‘m sorry. I usually come at night, didn’t realize it’d be this busy.” Sansa is the only looking at him now. He seems more uncomfortable than she’s ever seen him, his hands slightly shaking as they loosen the hair from his loose knot. His face becomes covered, and she realizes going to places must be equally or at least more awkward with his scars as it is for her going places with Lady. 

“It’s okay, really.” She tries to be reassuring, but he draws his arm away from her touch as if electrocuted. She remembers she is his professor, and that this is not a romance. 

When the hostess calls for their table, she looks equally scared of both. Sansa almost wants to laugh, thinking of telling Arya that she could be seen as scary. Their server is busy with other tables, and while they wait there is another silence. 

“What’re you thinking about getting?” Sansa just needs to break the silence. Silence makes her anxious. Makes her remember the rules of etiquette she forced herself to memorize in the fourth grade, makes her remember Joffrey silently plotting, makes her remember the disappointed look on Baelish’s face when she couldn’t think of another intelligent thing to add to a conversation in a subject she knew nothing about. 

“More than you.” It takes her more than a minute for her to realize he is attempting to joke. She laughs, and his head jerks up from the menu, as if her laughter was the equivalent to police sirens. She feels insecure, but then he actually smiles. She realizes she’s never seen him do that. She wonders what she could do to get him to do it again.

“I’ll have you know, good sir, that I didn’t get to be this tall without eating quite a bit.” She does not think about her family genes, and about how Arya is the only short one. 

“I’m no sir, professor.” 

“Then what are you? Should I call you student? Clegane, Sandor?” 

“Just Sandor.” 

“Then no professor, my name is Sansa or it’s nothing.” She’s being egotistical, quoting an old saying from the North. 

“We are Northern or we are nothing.” he mutters as he goes back to his menu. Sansa feels a rush of something, but it’s quickly covered by their waitress coming by to ask their drink orders. 

“I’ve been here before, you know.” She wants to challenge him, challenge what he thinks of her. She has been to this old diner with sticky booths and menus that use comic sans in their header. She was not too good for anything anymore.

He raises an eyebrow, “That so?” 

She nods, and he shrugs, the initial shock wearing off quicker than she expected it would, and she feels herself deflate not only at his reaction, but also at how childish she was being. They were grown adults, they didn’t need games to interact. 

“What’s your business?” He is in the midst of downing the coffee their waitress brought them, and she tries to seem patient. 

“My business?” 

“The other day, you mentioned you owned a business. What is it?” There were more subtle ways to get this, she knew, and part of her was cringing at how direct she was being, but she was also curious. 

He is still challenging her, not saying a word, just drinking his coffee as slow as possible. “I’m being serious, I want to know.” She tries to remain firm. 

“Really want to know?” His accent shifts the words, makes his ‘want to’ into a ‘wahnta.’ She remembers her etiquette, and how she doesn’t allow herself to slur ever. He leans in, his elbows taking up more than half the table, and his breath smells sweeter than she expected it to. He must’ve put cream in his coffee when she wasn’t looking. She tries to seem tough and challenging as well, straightens her shoulders, keeps her mouth in a straight line as she nods. 

“I’m in the mob. I kill people. Best time is during normal business hours, while they’re working.” She feels herself stiffen, and her eyes glaze over without her consent. He is just joking, she knows he is just joking, but it cannot help but pull her back into- He is shaking his hands in front of her, whispering soft words she didn’t know he was capable of, apologies intermingling with information 

“Shit ,I’m sorry, fuck, I’m sorry, hey Sansa hey, ok ‘t’s not much, just a construction company in town. Started working there after I retired from the army, ya know? Fuck, I’m sorry can you look at me, please fuck, E.B. says you gotta make sure you're breathing when this shit happens, are you breathin' fuck fuck fuuuuuck” She cuts him off with her hands, each one grabbing his own. She cannot speak yet, she got too close, but she tries to calm him down with her eyes. His hands hold hers back, and their fingers intertwine. 

The waitress comes back, asks for their order and the moment is broken and they both pull back as if burnt. Sansa wonders if it’s possible she didn’t notice she was sunburnt or if she was actually blushing like a school girl. She is still shaken though, and Lady is pressing her head into Sansa’s hands, her breath hot and a source of information for Sansa to focus on. She asks for whatever Sandor ordered, and the waitress whistles, but says nothing past that. Her eyes stay focused on the notepad, and refuses to look either of them in the eye. Sansa pretends to be as strong as Sandor is pretending to be.

“She’s a good dog.” 

Sansa nods, “She’s young though, barely finished her training a few months ago.” Lady is a safe subject. She can talk about Lady. “What happened to the dog from the trail?” 

His eyes light up, actually light up, something she thought only happened in movies with extremely handsome men, and especially didn’t consider as something which could happen with him, though she does not know if she could consider him unattractive anymore. Something about his eyes, the way he looked at her. She forces herself to focus on his words.

He talks more about this dog, who he apparently adopted and named Stranger, than he ever   
has talked about anything. He is in the middle of discussing a story in which Stranger ate a hole through his mattress to try to get to a bone that was underneath the bed which has Sansa actually laughing when the waitress places multiple plates of food in front of them. 

Sansa can feel her eyes widen, it’s much more than she thought it would be, but then she feels him smirking at her again. She begins to eat, being careful to not be too slow or too fast.   
He does not take this pace, instead goes straight to shoveling food into his mouth. He has no pretense, no attempt at grandeur. While she initially feels the urge to tell him to slow down and eat like a decent person, she realizes it allows her more freedom. Her elbows have moved to the table now, and she isn’t eating the biscuit in small chunks. 

She simply hands him a stack of napkins. He continues his story about Stranger, ending it with him buying a new mattress and blocking in the underside of his bed to prevent any more bones from being in there. Sansa trades his story with the first day she got Lady, and how her cousin Jon had assured her that the dog was fully trained. Only for Lady to be a little too well trained, and how she proceeded to bring Sansa her pill bottle every five minutes for 2 weeks straight. 

They begin to trade stories that begin to have less and less to do with dogs. He tells her how he first discovered this place because he was craving McDonald’s hashbrowns one day after his accident, but he couldn’t drive correctly because he was still bandaged and therefore not allowed to drive, so he ended up here at 4 in the morning demanding hashbrowns. She tells him about how Arya dragged her here on the anniversary of her ex boyfriend’s death. 

They do not ask questions past the surface. 

“Did the hashbrowns taste like McDonald’s?”

“Fuck no, so much better.” 

“Did she literally drag you? How fuckin’ tall is she?” 

“No, she had my brother, Robb, carry me while I was asleep. I woke up to the smell of pancakes, and Arya screaming at Hot Pie. She’s short.” 

She doesn’t ask him to explain the accident. He doesn’t ask her why they would celebrate the death of a man she once loved. Instead he pries into her family, asks how short is short for her (“Arya is”), if Robb was equally as short (“Same height as me, maybe an inch taller”), how the fuck did she not wake up in the car (“Sleeping was easy then”)? 

She counters with asking who’s car he took (“Doctor at the hospital, called him E.B.”), why McDonald’s hashbrowns (“They taste fuckin’ good”) and how he remembered his way back (“I didn’t, E.B. had to come get me. Hot Pie found my phone after I passed out.”)

The food and plates are all gone, half empty cups of coffee all that are left on the table when Sansa realizes how much time has passed. They’ve been talking for hours now. Their waitress has stopped refilling their coffee, and the check was long since paid for. Sandor realizes it at the same time, and he immediately stands up, awkward and too tall, still aware and unaware of his presence. They walk to their cars, and try to think of a thing to say, her to her student as a professor, him to his professor as a student. The stories linger in the air, unfinished, and Sansa regrets not asking him more. He nods, and opens the door to his truck slowly. 

“See you in class, Clegane, Sandor.” She tries to keep the mood light, away from the somber moment that this has become. 

He pauses, “Yeah,” closing the door, his voice once again unsure and somehow both more gruff and more soft than normal. She rushes to her car, setting Lady up inside, before taking a breath in the front seat, wondering what that was and why there were so many objects flying around in her head right now. She calms herself, unused to dealing with emotions that weren’t anxiety or fear. She feels, almost, curious and excited. 

As she drives away, she convinces herself that she is excited for her night class because they’re fixing to reach the Medieval Era, and she’s teaching a lesson on her specialty. It does not have anything to do with a tall man whose laughter still bounced around in her head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so lotta dialogue? lot more interaction than in the past! conversation! i didn't want it to go smoothly at first. finding your limits and where you can go conversation wise with people who have been hurt is never easy and i wanted to convey that for both of them? enjoy!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: abuse mention, tw: this chapter is about Sansa's abuse. nothing super explicit, or violent, but it is there. 
> 
> ps. double update? wow

There is a cold aspect to some abuse. Joffrey was fire, anger burning her at every second, her skin cracking off at his whim. 

Petyr, however, was cold. Warm when she first began his classes, eager to mention he knew her mom and how sorry he was about ‘what happened last spring.’ He held her the first time she had an anxiety attack in his office, whispering about her beauty and touching her hair harder than what could be considered comforting. He kissed her afterwards, and told her he knew special ways to comfort women. He told her he could help. 

The wolf in her had died long ago, turned into a doe into a dying rabbit whose throat had been ripped out because it was inedible. She could not revive herself, he told her. She needed him, he whispered when he held her on his desk. Did she think she could escape what had happened because Joffrey was dead? No, she was all alone. Her family would never understand what Joffrey had done, but Petyr? 

Petyr knew everything. Knew where the scars were, and even told her what specific weapon left them. He was the only one who knew exactly what happened, he said. He would help her, and all he needed was her everything.

And so Sansa was gone from one castle where fire burned her insides to charred ashes, and fell instead into a tower, with a man who whispered sweet nothings as he buried her in the architecture.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sansa as a character tends to fictionalize a lot of what happens to her (which like same af) but so if it came off a little,,, less intense,,, than it actually was it's me trying to stay in her character and also it's me trying to not brutalize any of you guys with graphic descriptions of abuse that i'm sure we can all live without. thanks and please enjoy.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm so sorry. midterms are killer. short chapter, but i wanted to introduce a new character!

She does not rush through the classes before her night class. Does not do her hair nicer, or add anything extra to her makeup routine. One Halloween she used makeup to make herself look like a deer, made her large eyes larger, a set of deer ears sitting on her head, easy prey for- She breathes in deeply, forces herself to feel what she is feeling, to identify it. Her newest therapist, tall, blonde, strong, not a man, has her breakdown her moments, thinks getting to the root of them will make them easier to handle. 

She is feeling scared because of men who hurt her in the past. She is recognizing something she does to make herself more attractive to men, and she is connecting that to an instance of pain and it is understandable, but it is wrong. Putting makeup on does not make her easy prey, and nothing she did was to blame for what happened. It would have happened no matter what, because those men were predators. If not her, somebody else. 

Her internal thoughts become mutters at the end, not quite strong enough to stay in her mind. 

She pats herself on the back nonetheless, and notes the instance in her phone. She also hugs Lady, but she does not make note of that. She will get stronger. The class hasn’t started yet, and many students hadn’t come in yet which she was glad of. She was not ashamed of Lady, aware that the dog was a necessary part of Sansa’s recovery and a dear gift from her still slightly estranged family, but the questions of why she required a service dog were too hard to avoid, and tended to her having her moments. Sandor never asked, but Sandor was also not here. 

She didn’t allow herself to think about it. He never showed up early, but was also never late. Right around 5 minutes before class, Sansa found herself glancing towards his seat, still seeming very empty. When the clock determined it was time to begin, and she had a mostly full classroom, still without him, she hesitated for a minute, giving him a chance to appear sitting there, like always. The hesitation was for naught, and she proceeded to begin the lesson, her voice slightly smaller than it was before. 

Once class is done she checks her phone, looking for an email that was required to be sent if a student misses a class and wants an excused absence. There was nothing. She does not allow herself to worry. 

-

“Sandor missed class.” She didn’t intend to begin with this. She had her notes ready to analyze her moments, their frequency, what they were about, possible solutions. Ms. Tarth, please call me Brienne, raises her eyebrows, not used to Sansa volunteering information. Sansa dislikes therapy, dislikes the idea of having to be completely honest with somebody, dislikes the moments where she must get personal. She likes taking a step back, when they’re allowed to be analytical. Making lists, coming up with vague solutions, processing her trauma through self alienation is what Ms. Tarth calls it. She is fine with that. She is not okay when it comes to addressing herself. 

“This is the Sandor who you met hiking, correct?” Sansa nods. Ms. Tarth does not use a clipboard, says it alienates clients, makes them uncomfortable, but Sansa can see her stacking away that piece of knowledge in her brain anyways, annoyed that she used the hiking incident as an example of her panic attacks. 

“How do you feel about him?” 

“I… don’t know. I know that’s a bad answer, but that’s a bad question. How I feel doesn’t matter, I’ve felt plenty of good things towards people before, and I’ve gotten destroyed every tim-”

“Sansa, your judgement is still valid,” Brienne leans forward, “I know that at our first few sessions we talked about what happened to you, and that was very hard, I understand, but this is a process, and it does not end with you simply recognizing that you were abused. What those people did to you changed how you viewed yourself, would you agree?” 

Sansa nods slightly, and wraps her arms around Lady. 

“So what we have to do is look at that as well. How those people made you think of yourself is wrong, and just because they happened to you does not mean that you are the one in the wrong.” 

Sansa forces herself to breath, and Ms. Tarth gives her a moment of silence. 

“I see,” Sansa measures her words, weighs them, “potential to like him, but I’m scared. Very, very scared.” 

Ms. Tarth nods, encouraging her to continue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i was afraid of a stagnant Sansa. as she was in previous chap. she wasn't really ready for relationships. this is kind of a way for her to grow, and push past her trauma. please tell me if you think brienne is ooc i'll fix her i promise, i wanted to start off formal with her.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi! an actual reasonably length chapter is headed your way, thank you all for your patience!

An email, from a person who was not her student, with a hospital stay notice attached is what she returns from therapy to. “Sandor Clegane was being a moron, and electrocuted himself. He is being detained in the hospital, and sends his regards, and hopes you will not count his absence against his obviously already glorious participation grade. Best regards, Jaime Lannister.” 

She does not fall into Lannister traps. She does not let his name hurt her. She thinks of Ms. Tarth and breathing, and not of a man who ran away from facing his nephew’s cruelty and not of his sister, especially not, of his sister. Cersei is gone, and so is Joffrey and so is Petyr. Sansa survived. Sansa is the one who is living. Jaime never hurt her, but he did leave. Left the Lannisters, left the money, left her. He had resources, savings that were just his, out of Lannister reach, had friends, had a car, and he left and he did not take her with him. 

Sansa cannot blame him. She would not have gone with the uncle of the man who tortured her. The castle convinced her everything had eyes, and for the Golden Lannister to come to her and beg to leave would not have read as real life. She would have stayed. Ms. Tarth told her that when people are abused or hurt, their body releases endorphins to help with the pain. The brain begins to relate this feeling to the thing causing it, and begins to bond in order to survive the trauma. Her brain began to relate it to Joffrey. 

How was he friends with Sandor? Sandor, strong and proud and morals as strong as a brick wall friends with Jaime Lannister? How did he get electrocuted? What hospital was he at? She pulls up the attachment again, copies the name of the hospital into her maps app and begins to lock up her office.  
-

She has nothing against hospitals, surprisingly, no demons hide in these walls. The receptionist does not glance at Lady, probably used to seeing service dogs. Sansa asks for directions to the room number, and she does not raise her eyebrows. She does not know that Sansa is his professor, and that while this is not the least appropriate thing they have done (brunch at a diner with no other students was sure to raise more than just eyebrows) Sansa felt… almost nervous. In a giddy way. In a she wondered if she could talk to him more way. She wondered how long he would be here, and if he was here for a long time they could set up agreements for her to bring his class work to him, maybe she could give him small lessons to make up for the material. 

As she gets closer to the room, the constant noise that comes with a hospital lowers to almost nothing. There’s complete silence in his room, and the door is locked. She tries pulling on the handle, peaks inside, straining her eyes to be more powerful before returning to the nurse’s station. 

“My,” what does she call him? Student? Friend? The first man she might actually have a crush on?, “friend, Sandor Clegane, was staying at this hospital but his room seems to be empty. Could you tell me if he was moved or checked out?” 

“I can’t give out personal details to non-family members. I’m sorry ma’am.” 

Sansa drove 15 minutes to get here, a place where she shouldn’t be anyway, and could feel herself begin to break. “Please, he’s very,” Sansa took a breath and wiped her eyes, “very special to me.” 

The nurse blushed, and Sansa could see her begin to debate between letting her know and sticking to the rules. Before she could make a decision, however, “Come on now, Sandra, who’re you to stop this girl from finding out where her boyfriend is?” A man, tag reading Jaime Lannister, leaned against the nurse’s chair, not looking at Sansa. “He checked out about 10 minutes ago, he should be home by no-” He stopped talking when he looked up, seeing who she was. His face fell into what Arya called the “fuckin’ pity ass face” quicker than she thought it could. His was deeper though, his pity also included a hardened jawline, guilt making his face sharp. 

“Sansa.” She nodded, and tried to recite her earlier resolution. He was a coward, but she could not hold him accountable for the sins of his family. Doing this did not require her to be kind, however. 

Lannister,” she sees him flinch, something she didn’t know could even be visible. “He’s home?” She tries to make her voice stay steady, stay even. He nods, and looks, if possible, more guilty. She’s on the edge as well, something Lady has picked up on, her nose nuzzling against Sansa’s hands. 

“Do you know where that is?” His voice is also fighting to stay calm, and she realizes they are two brittle strawmen both fighting to do something as simple as stand. His eyes ran red too once, and her sufferings are not his knowledge, just as his sufferings are not hers. She shakes her head. “Would you be okay with me driving you?” 

Sansa feels every bit of her body screeching. Feels the world freeze ice beneath her fingertips feels Joffrey’s burns on her back feels her mind telling her no do not go do not fall back into the trap run please run. “Brienne would actually be the one driving, it wouldn’t be just me. I know you don’t know her but she’s really comforting, helped me out with more than anybody.” She wonders if Ms. Tarth knows somebody so spectacular shares her first name.

“I’ll go.” He stills, Sandra the nurse who was trying to subtly leave the tension filled situation stills as well, and even Lady seems to question this decision. Sansa’s courage begins to leave her, and the Lannister jumps back into action, reaching past Sandra to type something in the computer, saying, “Wait here please,” before running into an area she can’t see before emerging with a jacket to wear over his scrubs. 

“It’s cold” he shrugs. He leads her to the front entrance, where the taxi dropped her off earlier, and leads her to where a small blue car is waiting, his arms spread wide as he yells for “His Brienne” The car does not respond, and he heads for the backseat. 

“Are you not getting in the front?” 

“I feel like it’ll make you more comfortable to not have to sit in the back of a car with a Lannister leading you around, don’t you think?” 

She nods, and opens the door to find Ms. Tarth staring at her, then back at where Jaime is buckling himself in. 

“She wanted to see Sandor, but he checked himself out.” The ease he has now makes Sansa recall his Lannister days, but before she can relapse, he laughs at the look Ms. Tarth gives him and Sansa realizes she can’t remember hearing his laugh before. 

“Are you okay, Sansa? How are you feeling? If you need him to leave he can.” 

“He’s okay. I just,” am terrified, am a dying rabbit, have a fear of all Lannister, “am adjusting.” 

“You want to go to Sandor’s house? Did you find out why he was gone from class?” 

“Didn’t Jaime tell you? Is that a breach of contract? Are you even allowed to do this legally?” 

“Legally, Jaime can’t tell me anything about his patients either, and no and yes.” Jaime nods in the rearview mirror, but other than that seems content to be a quiet presence in the backseat.

The car has began moving, and Sansa notices that Ms. Tarth doesn’t need directions. “Ms. Tarth, do you know where he lives?” 

“Brienne, Sansa, call me Brienne. He’s our neighbor, technically.” She is still using a softer voice than Sansa thinks she actually has, and Sansa quiets down. Ms. Tarth, or Brienne, seems to want to discuss this, Sansa seeing and interacting with a Lannister for the first time in years, but also seems to know boundaries. Jaime leans forward from the backseat and turns the radio up. 

\- 

All three of them are standing in front of Sandor’s door, though Sansa is leaning against the wall, and Brienne and Jaime are loudly playing rock, paper, scissors to decide who is going to knock because Sansa has opted out when they hear “I swear to god if you two don’t shut the fuck up, the doors fucking unlocked you know I can’t move you sick fu-” before Jaime throws open the door, and Sansa finally sees a glimpse Sandor for the first time in a week. He looks worse than she has ever seen him, but his neck brace seems to take any seriousness out of the experience. She’s vaguely reminded of the flea cone she had to put on Rickon’s dog when she lived at home. He isn’t looking at her, as she has not moved from her wall spot, and is instead saying something rude to Jaime while Brienne takes the bag she brought to an area Sansa can’t see. She suddenly doesn’t know if she would belong in this scene. Lady whines beside her and Sansa is reminded that Sandor has a life beyond class and a one time breakfast at a greasy cafe and she does not know where hurt, traumatized girl who seems too small for even herself fits. 

“Go close the fuckin door do you want the whole goddamn complex to walk in?” 

“So moody.” Jaime whines as he comes closer to the door, motioning her in. “We’re only here because somebody wanted to come visit you.” 

“And for you to eat!” She hears Brienne boom from the room she can’t see. 

Jaime is at the door now, and he motions her forward yet again. Lady nuzzles her legs again, and Sansa finally unfreezes, and walks into the apartment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i know i'm really bad about cliff hangers and i'm sorry we've gone 2 chapters with no sansa/sandor interaction but like i promise the next few chapters are fixing to be basically 90% sansan so like please don't hate me too much. thank you! i'm also sorry my chapters tend to be short it's just that i'm coming from writing all short one shots to trying to write this so i promise the next chapter will be longer i'm trying to work my way up to it. thanks again


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so prepare for: fluff, barely any angst (don't worry, i refuse to go without angst for too long so it'll be back soon) annnnd pEAK slow burn.

Sandor’s apartment was nicer than she expected, larger than it seemed outside the hall. Not decorated, but clean. She closes the door behind her softly, Jaime still urging her on. Sandor, with his back to the door, seemed smaller than she thought the large man could ever seem.

“The fuck you mean somebody wanted to see me? If you brought that friggin’ nurse her-” She had walked around to the couch now, finally within his limited eyeshot, the surprise on his face silencing any curse he had planned for Jaime. She didn’t think Sandor could ever be shocked, thought he was prepared for everything, but apparently she thought wrong. At the same time, however, seeing him more out of context than she had ever seen him, his hair down, flannel pajama pants on, relaxed in a chair with a dog on his lap also had her staring, just as shocked. 

“Can I sit?” She motioned to the couch beside the chair weakly, suddenly feeling the moment become less shock and more something else that Brienne was sure to grill her about if she had seen. He nodded, almost self conscious. 

“Sorry it’s such a wreck in the place, didn’t know I’d be getting anybody except those two beasts.” He motioned to the kitchen where Jaime had escaped and she could vaguely hear conversation.

“It’s fine! Really, I just ran into Jaime at the hospital and he had sent the email and I figured I’d come by.” She was flailing, her bravery suddenly turning into anxious realization about where she was. “Oh! Speaking of, I brought my notes from the lesson over, I don’t know if you have friends in the class, and got notes from them but I figured I’d rather be safe than sorry, also if you’re not going to be able to come to the next lesson I haven’t finished it yet, but I could prepare it here really quickly and give you those. They’re really just footnotes to help me remember what I need to teach, but it should be enough for you to grasp it and al-” 

She was ranting, rambling even, a habit she thought she had dropped years ago, and she forced herself to be quiet, avoided forcing her face into her hands, and suddenly felt the epitome of stupid. She was making a fool of herself, and she had already been so brave today and this was so inappropriate on at least seventeen different levels. She tried to force herself to focus on the stack of printed notes, straightening them in her lap, her eyes on trying to get the corners to disappear behind her. And then she finally got the courage to look at him to apologize, and to her ultimate dismay saw him looking as distraught as she felt. She was used to disappointment, anger, possibly unhappiness, but distraught was not something she was used to seeing from men. It especially didn’t help that she was now also realizing that his neck brace was at least a size too small, and that he had reading glasses on the table next to him, which definitely did not seem like they would fit his head either. 

And then, she found herself realizing how ridiculous they both were. A scared giant and a scared rabbit both knocked off normality because of a change of setting. They looked at each other again and found herself, actually, giggling, almost laughing, she tried to hide it, prim and proper telling her that it was rude, but then she saw him smile, and she was off, the small giggle turning into an actual laugh. Lady excited by her noise began to paw at her knees, and even Sandor’s dog moved from it’s place on the Sandor’s lap. Sandor began laughing too, his hand over his mouth, scars contorting with his smile. His laugh was rougher, more of a guffaw than an actual laugh, which just made her laugh more. “I’m,” another small giggle, “so sorry.” She said, trying to calm herself down, jaw hurting and hand on Lady’s head. 

“Don’t be, Little Bird.” He tried to shake his head, motion that it wasn’t a big deal, only to quickly regret that, hand going to his neck brace with a cringe. She found herself standing up slightly, arms outstretched towards him, instinct making her want to help. Her hand was on his arm before prim and proper set in, another moment of feeling replacing logic, before she realized she had dropped her notes on the ground and used that as a way to avoid another moment of confronting her feelings. After putting them in order and straightening them out again she handed them to him, his moment of pain gone. 

“Again, they’re probably not as comprehensive as the lesson, but it’s the best I can do personally.” He reached for his glasses, which to Sansa’s predication were slightly too small, and began to lift his arms up, before wincing again. 

“What do you need?” 

“My fuckin’ hair. Gets in my face when I’m reading.” He wasn’t wrong. Even simply tilting his head down towards the notes had led to waves of hair falling in front of his face, some strands tangled in the glasses. 

“Hair band?” He motioned to the table, she found herself disappointed it wasn’t on his wrist. Hair band on her wrist, she walked around to his back to try to put up his hair, already intimidated. Sansa Stark did not do messy buns. Her hair was never messy, if it was a more relaxed style it was on purpose, controlled chaos her calling, only achievable after hours which required curling, product, and extreme amounts of hairspray to keep the chaos absolutely perfect. Lazy days called for braids or high ponytails, both styles that could read as professional but still required less effort. Messy buns were nearly impossible to read as professional, and with how long her hair was, ultimately ended up slowly dropping off the top of her head to more resemble a sad bird nest than intentional. 

In contrast, she had never seen Sandor in a bun that was not considered messy. So she was trying. She really was. She didn’t want him to feel uncomfortable, but as she slowly pulled the hair up she realized exactly how out of depth she was. The bun was higher than she had even seen Sandor do it, and she couldn’t help it but she was obsessively smoothing out every bump that happened. Taking a breath, she reasoned that this was Sandor and honestly, who was he to judge her? He was in flannel pajamas. Stranger, Sandor’s dog had wandered into Sandor’s bedroom, and Lady quickly followed. Sansa would’ve been worried, except Sandor’s apartment was so small she could see that the two of them weren’t fighting, just falling asleep on his bed. Which even from here she could tell was huge, larger than her own for sure. An image of her waking up in that bed, stretching the full extent of her limbs, then curling back into the giant that was Sandor flashed through her mind, and she wondered what he was like when he first woke up.

“You’re talkin’ about how the Long Winter was what spurred on the Renaissance and the age of knowledge, but I thought that it was because of lack of faith in the Seven?” She snapped herself out of the daydream, focused on finishing the bun and then answering his question as she moved back onto her spot on the couch, slightly further than she had been.

“The Long Winter was the cause of the lack of faith. The Seven blamed the people on the Long Winter, said their sins had led the Gods to punish them and only by repenting would the world be spared. When priests began dying from the cold, and the winter refused to end, people realized that the church knew as much as they did, and refused to be reliant on the church.” 

He nodded, “So her-” he pointed to the notes, and she leaned forward, eager to teach. 

-

 

“Dinner is a ready.” Jaime said with a flourish, snapping Sansa and Sandor out of their discussion, which had somehow moved away from the cause of the Renaissance and to her telling her favorite story about the Winter Queen and her sworn shield. She had just reached the climax of the tale, and pinnacle of the Queen’s politics, where the Queen sent out multiple notices, a total of which 23 had been found all over dig sites for the past century, which meant that she had sent this as far as she could, leaving no stone unturned, declaring herself unwilling to marry and that any noble who wished to challenge her claim would be free to a fight to the death to her sworn shield. His name is not mentioned, which was a hotly debated topics among her colleagues and that she had even discussed in a minor academic journal once. For a Queen to rule without ever marrying during it was revolutionary even during later centuries, in the Early Long Winter days, it was unheard of in the Seven Kingdoms, with only Dorne allowing women to even inherit. 

Sandor ignored Jaime, looking back at her, “Think she was ashamed of him?” 

Sansa shook her head vehemently, “I think she did as much as she could. To declare him as the opponent of potential suitors clearly labels him as the standard she has set for marriage. It’s likely she wanted to protect him, and herself. Her being Queen was unprecedented, and though she was loved by her people, she had many enemies simply due to being a ruler at this time. Even her own Northern lords were dissatisfied with this declaration, you know actually, most of these notices were found in relations between Northern lords and the people who destroyed Winterfell after her death. This means that he almost certainly wasn’t Northern, as the North is loyal to a fault to their people, and so that means they were dissatisfied with the sworn shield, so they both were probably facing conflict from all nobility at this time. So this was probably a way to try to end conflict before it began.” 

“Here I am, with a beautiful bounty of food in my hands, and I am being ignored for a history lesson.” 

“What in the fuck is that?” Sandor looked offended at the plates in Jaime’s hands. 

“Fish! Precut for you, uncut for the lady. Sorry it took so long, we didn’t realize that Sandor’s fridge would consist of mashed potatoes and porridge.” 

“Why’s it cut up? I didn’t break my arms.” It was until she reached for the plate Jaime was handing her that she noticed an absence of Sandor’s arm, and realized they had been leaning in so close that their knees and arms had been touching as they huddled over their notes. Sitting straight in her spot, Sandor readjusted as well, and she wondered if he noticed the lack of touching, before refocusing on the argument Jaime and Sandor were currently passionately engaged in.

“I swear to god you two are like children. Two seconds, Jaime, you’ve been in the room two seconds.” Brienne’s presence was quickly noticed by all parties. 

“Brienne, my love, my beauty, he is being ridiculou-”

“I’m not gonna eat cut up fuckin’ fish like I’m five years old.” 

Brienne ignored both of them in favor of Sansa, “They’re not bothering you, are they? Do you need anything to drink?”

Sansa shook her head no to both and Brienne nodded, sitting on the opposite end of the couch. Jaime ignored Sandor to go back into the kitchen for his plate, only for Brienne to motion to where she had set it in the small area on the coffee table that wasn’t covered in Sansa and Sandor’s notes. As they grabbed their plates and Jaime took a seat on the edge of the couch, scooting Brienne over, Sandor and Jaime continued bickering, somehow moving on to how Jaime had mothered him when he came into the hospital. 

“Why did you leave so soon? I thought a broken neck would require at least some stay in the hospital.”

Sandor huffed in response, “I didn’t break my neck. I strained a tendon in it. I don’t even need to wear this fuckin’ brace, he’s fuckin’ forcing me to.”

“It’s safer! The less strain on your neck, the better!” Brienne nodded in agreement, declaring herself equally adept at the parent role, if slightly more reserved. Sansa laughed, and soon the conversation turned towards whether the doctor who actually attended to Sandor’s injury took precedent to Jaime (Sansa sided with Sandor on this, and hoped nobody saw her blush when he yelled in triumphant at her supporting him.) 

-

 

Once the food was finished, Sansa asked about food and drink for Lady, as it was way past the dog’s dinner time. As Jaime and Brienne cleaned up the living room, Sandor led her to the pantry that he kept the dog food in. She was pleasantly surprised that Sandor actually fed Stranger the same mix she fed Lady, and began to measure out Lady’s dinner as he filled a bowl with water. She finished first, and set the bowl on the ground, whistling to signal to Lady that her dinner was ready. As she walked over to the sink where he was filling the bowl, she noticed he was being quiet, even for Sandor. Leaning her back against the counter, she looked up at where he was aggressively avoiding her eyes. 

“So there’s this documentary about the Long Night, it’s by the History channel so it’s probably stupid as fuck, but we could watch it after they leave. If you want. If it’s fuckin’ shit we can just talk about how stupid it is, but if it’s not then it’d at least be interestin’, ya know?” He was nervous, even his curses sounding unsure. 

Sansa to her shock, found herself nodding, “Sure.”  
The bowl overflowed in his hands, and she realized he actually hadn’t moved, despite the water running on his hands. She laughed, then pushed him off to the side slightly, wedging her way between him and the counter, replacing his hands with her own, before tipping the excess water out of the bowl and setting it down where Lady was waiting. She reached up to turn off the faucet, only for it to already be off, Sandor slowly gaining back his range of motion after the shock. It was then she realized how extremely close they had gotten. 

When she had been reaching for the bowl, she had only felt it along her back, but as she turned around to look at him, she realized that she had taken a step towards him, her hands lightly pressing against his stomach, and when she tried to tilt her head up she found his chin instead. He looked down, and she could actually feel his breath, shaky and unsure, on her face. His hands found her sides, his touch barely there, more like ghosting over than actually touching. One of her hands traveled up his stomach, feeling how fast his heart was racing, before resting at his neck, tangling in the hairs that had fallen loose from the bun, pulling his face down slowly, until she could feel his lips ghost over he-

“We cleaned up the plates and the glasses but don’t think for a second we’re touching your notes. That’s your mes-” And they both pulled back as if they had been burned, Sansa kneeling down to pet Lady and Sandor grabbing the dishes from Brienne without a word.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh my god, I am spent. This is so long. but i did it! lots of interaction, and this was an actual fun chapter. minimal angst! pls don't hate me for the almost kiss. i had to. fanfic is just me creating every cheesy moment ive every wanted to see happen, almost kisses, them geeking out over stuff together, sansa giving him a manbun?. do u know how many modern au's have Sandor with a manbun but never have Sansa do the man bun for him? my dream. thanks for reading!


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another chapter! 2 updates in 2 days! wow. warning for Sansa discussing traumatic events, specifically what happened between her and Joffrey. There are dashes (-) to mark the beginning and end of it

Sansa took herself to the couch quickly after the incident in the kitchen, messing with her fingers while she listened to the incoherent tones of the three of them in the kitchen, Sandor’s voice a hard rumble. Sansa was reminded of being home the months after, her family convening in separate rooms to discuss her, with her father’s soft sobs emanating through the walls anyway. Lady, finished with her dinner, found her way to Sansa’s lap, with Stranger trying to claim space as well, both trying to calm her. 

Finally, Sandor emerged free of the neck brace, Brienne and Jaime trailing behind him. He didn’t look at her, instead sitting down in his chair and motioning for Stranger to move to his lap. The dog seemed content where it was, however, and Sandor scoffed. 

“Me and Brienne are leaving. Sansa, stay as long as long as you want. If you want he can drive you, or we do get Uber in these parts of the city if he scares you off.” Jaime was attempting to wink, play the light hearted game, but Brienne behind him, nervous looking like a mother hen, made Sansa hold both dogs closer. “Sandor, I swear to fucking god if you move your neck too much I’m putting the neck brace back on.” 

“Don’t push yourself too much, Sansa. I’m right next door if you need it, and remember your practices.” Brienne’s voice was softer than she had ever heard it, and Sansa was comforted, but also felt suffocated. She was 30 years old. She could handle watching a movie with a man. 

They left slowly, and with the soft close of the door, Sansa and Sandor were alone. Neither of them speak, the weight of what was happening hitting them both. Sansa hadn’t been in a room alone with a man since before she can remember. 

“Sorry ‘bout them, I fuckin’ hate when people say this, but they mean well, ya’ know? They’re just overbearing.” His attempt at conversation sounds small suddenly as the weight of her decision suddenly hits her, and the room becomes small. Her lungs are weights in an ocean unable to do anything and she realizes she is gasping for air. 

And then Sandor is in front of her, kneeling, but not touching, “Hey, shit, hey Sansa it’s okay, okay what’s your exercises that she said she talked about exercises, oh fuck all, do you wanna laugh, I can tell you how I fucked up my neck Sansa, I promise I will never hurt you, just, just please fuckin’ breathe, in and out, in and out, just like that, fuck yeah Bird, you’re doing perfect, doin’ just great, just focus on breathin’ please, just like that, perfect. You’re doin’ great, you’re fuckin’ awesome, okay,” she slowly regains awareness, her breathing controlled, the basic action taking all of her effort. As Sandor continues in the background, one of the dogs on her lap is licking her face according to training the other one is pacing up and down the couch in worry, 

“Bird? You alright?” His voice is clear again, soft tones not suiting his throat, making it rougher than it was. She nods in response, but has fallen back against the couch, out of the attempted fetal position, and his face is further away, now slightly obscured by Lady’s fur. He stays kneeling, but even kneeling he’s taller than her. His bun has gotten loose again, her attempt at perfection failing already, and she counts the strands at the same rate she counts her breath. He nods back, and stands, moving back to his chair. Her knees go cold from his lack of presence.

“How’d you get hurt?” 

“Huh?” He’s distracted, Stranger has decided he’s had enough of crazy lady and misses his dad, and is trying to climb up.

“You said it was a funny story, how’d you get hurt?” 

“Oh, it’s not that funny, I don’t,” he’s uncomfortable again, and she’s reminded of the first time they met, how he struggled under her stare, used to his strength being enough to take people’s attention off of him, “We’re workin’ with this new electrical company, and this kid, new kid, barely been workin’ with ‘em a week, tells me that we’re disconnected because his section of the grid won’t light up. I say we’ve been connected the past week, how else does he think we’re off the generators, and he says obviously not, little fucker, and he fights me on it for a solid half hour, tells me what I need to do to get connected, as if I haven’t owned this company for a decade, so I go to his grid and it turns out he’s tryin’ to connect the wrong circuits, and his board is off, so I fix it, with him yellin’ over my shoulder the entire time by the way, and then when I’m done I’m so pissed off because he’s still saying he deserves to be paid even though I did his fuckin’ job that I throw my gloves at him, an’ start rippin’ into the little fucker, tellin’ him exactly where I’ll take his pay, and when I get real mad I throw my hands around, a lot, keep motionin’ to exactly where the fucker fucked up, with my screwdriver still in hand and all that and it connected to the circuit board for just long enough to burn the fuck outta me, and made me seizure ‘n shit, crackin’ my neck. The poor fucker pissed himself, though, made it worth it.” 

She thinks that’s the most she’s ever heard Sandor talk, and she also thinks she needs to let Jaime know his email was fitting, and that Sandor was in fact being a moron. She also thinks she’s still drowning slightly, and hasn’t taken her hand off Lady. She does laugh a little, the idea of Sandor, stoic, powerful man being reduced to a petty child by some random kid. 

“I told you it was fuckin’ funny! Brienne and Jaime just fuckin’ flipped.” His excitement somehow makes her laugh more, a lighter version of him than she’s seen. 

“It’s horrible, you probably scared that kid to death.” She tries to be stern, but she still is struggling with speaking, and the laughing doesn’t help, so it comes out quiet and weak. He hesitates, but still laughs. She tries to focus on breathing again. 

“Lemme find this movie. I know it’s on the history channel tonight, I just don’t know the number. Need a blanket or anythin’ just tell me, better to get it now ya know? Before these guys fall asleep on both of us.” He motions to the dogs. She nods, and asks for a blanket. He hands off the remote and deems her channel finder, before going to look for a blanket in his bedroom. She can still see him, but feels herself drifting out of safety, the unlikely chance of this going bad returning on her. Petyr made her feel safe, and Petyr hurt her. Joffrey made her feel safe at first, because he relished watching fear creep into her expression. Sandor was a soft strength, a giant who was as gentle with her as he was with Stranger, but there was no telling how a man could hurt. Gentle can hurt too. 

“Here, it’s from my sister, so it’s new, never used before.” That snaps her out of it, the blanket still in packaging being held out in her direction was the soft kind, sensory friendly, and she quickly grabbed in and began unwrapping it. 

“Ya find it?” He asks, returning Stranger to his lap after wrapping the dog in a smaller blanket. She shakes her hand, handing the remote over in failure. He returns to clicking, and she wraps the blanket around herself, forming a cocoon around her and Lady. He finds the movie, a documentary she can tell is going to be cheesy already, the opening credits filled with recreations of “Long Night wars”, dragons flying in and out (a myth that will never die), and no historians that she recognizes being listed. Normally he was right, she would love this kind of film, but instead she finds herself falling down into the abyss. Every weapon looks like Joffrey, and every politician looks like Petyr, and soon she is at her limit. Sandor tries to comment, laughs at their inaccuracies, but eventually he can’t seem to be quiet. 

“You alright?” 

She wants to say yes. Every aspect of her being, years of etiquette and abuse training her to please people and be polite screams at her to say yes. She shakes her head no. He’s quiet, giving her a chance to speak. 

“You know, I didn’t always even want to go to college?” He raises his eyebrows in disbelief, “It’s true. I wanted to be like my mom. Stay at home mother, tons of kids, go to galas and charity events when necessary but come home and make a million cookies. I had dreams of living in the South, where the glamour was, but no real goals. My dad had this friend, Rob, who had a son who was a freshman in college when I was in my senior year, and he invited me down to tour his college with him. We went, the whole family, and I saw Joffrey and it fell into place.” 

“Sansa, you don’-” She shook her head, cutting him off. She had never told the full story before. Fragments of a fairy tale in her head are comforting, but they hold no weight, don’t hold the memories back. She needs this. 

“He was perfect, handsome, rich, wanted to go into the family business. I applied for his college the day I toured it. We started dating the first month I was at college. It was perfect.”

-

And it was. He was the perfect prince. It was a slow fall. Even when she changed her major her first semester to something she was actually passionate about, she still didn’t picture herself working, just being with Joffrey. 

He hurt her for the first time at a party her sophomore year. He pushed her, nothing major, nothing anything batted eyes at. He had been drinking too much, and she had been trying to tell him to stop, and he didn’t want to. Who wouldn’t push her off? 

The second time, he wasn’t drunk but he was hungover. She had been trying to make bacon, but the oil had burnt him. Of course he would push her. He apologized afterwards, and told her how much he loved her and appreciated her making him food, she just should’ve known better. Then she stopped learning the reasons. They came quick, and so did the apologies. He loved her, he just had anger problems. He never did it if they were around friends, unless they were drinking. And then who’s really to blame? 

Sansa graduated with her Bachelor’s 2 years early, the extreme amount of dual credit her parents forced her to do paying off. She applied to universities in the North for her Doctorate, now determined to study history for as long as possible. He found out the night before her graduation party, and he was so distraught. He gripped her arms so tight as he sobbed, and she remembered thinking about the past two years and how he had never seemed small until that moment. And she remembered being terrified. Everybody goes through rough patches, how weak was she that she wanted to leave at the first sign of a struggle? At the party the next day her mother saw the bruises on her arms, and her anger was visceral, burning through the room like fire. Joffrey and Sansa left while Cat screamed at Cersei. 

Sansa’s phone was soon blowing up with messages from her family, demanding she come home, demanding she leave him. Cersei took it, citing it as a source of stress for Sansa. The first summer, Robert, along with Joffrey’s siblings died in a plane crash, leaving Cersei alone and desperate, with only Joffrey and Sansa to comfort her, Jaime moving in only to leave within the first two weeks, obviously shaken by the state of the family. But Sansa stayed. For this, Cersei offered to pay for Sansa’s doctorate program, implying that Sansa should stay at their home from now on. To save on costs, of course, and they were already so close. Sansa moved into her own room, but Joffrey found ways in. And Sansa discovered how cruel he could be. 

Unhinged from losing his father, who had not left him total control of the company, but instead had entrusted it to her own father, and in his own domain with no limits, there unleashed a beast. She does not know how time passed those days, only remembers fear, so intense that the sound of footsteps would set her off running in the opposite direction. She remembers cruelty, the feel of a blade against her, his cold laughter, she remembers the house. She does not remember going outside until her program started, and Cersei let her go, on the condition Joffrey walked her to and from classes. 

“You’re so special to us dear, we can’t risk losing you.” 

One day however, Sansa breaks. She sees Joffrey outside of her end of semester review, just standing, but with such power she could feel the cuts on the back of her thighs, and she breaks. It was the first panic attack she ever had. The ambulance is almost called, but Joffrey and Cersei swoop in before that can happen, citing stress as the cause. 

Cersei pulls her out of the program, and soon she does not leave the house. That Spring, nearing the anniversary of Robert’s death, and in the midst of a court battle that had been raging since his death about who rightfully owned the company, sees both Baratheons at their breaking point. Cersei, the source of comfort after her son’s cruelty, begins to ignore Sansa completely, only speaking to reprimand, and demand alcohol. Joffrey, bored with his mother and soon even Sansa, looked elsewhere for pleasure. Sansa suggests he takes up racing, said Robb told her when she was younger the biggest high he ever had was when he had taken molly and sped his car down a highway. Joffrey beats her for the stupid suggestion, asks if she wants him to die, but he was too prideful. Took the bait, took it farther. His body, mangled from the car crash, had substances of multiple hard drugs, with enough cocaine alone to cause an overdose. 

Sansa left that night, stealing one of Joffrey’s credit cards to buy a plane ticket North while Cersei was arrested for threatening to kill the doctors who couldn’t save her son. Sansa heard that she committed suicide upon release, too distraught to be reasoned with. She didn’t care. She was home. Without Joffrey. But the fear was still there, and she found she didn’t remember how to do things without hearing his voice. 

-

Sandor hands her a glass of water, silent, trying to restrain his anger. The documentary was nearing the end, and she watched the credits begin to roll with more ease than she imagined she would ever be able to. Her trauma was sitting at the front of her mind, but she talked about it. Gave it a voice, read it out. She still had shakes, and Lady was still in her lap, but she had spoken over it. 

“I’d kill the fucker if he wasn’t already dead.” Sandor’s voice was dangerously low, but she ignored it, “He the source of the attacks?” 

She shrugs, “Some of them, he’s not my only monster.” 

She finally looks in his eyes, and finds him not pitying her, but filled with what appeared to be admiration under the rage. “You don’t deserve that shit, you know? Like fuck. I can see why I got shit to me, but I’m a fuckin’ fuck, you though? Fuckin’ hells.” 

“You don’t deserve what you went through.” Her statement is as strong as she can make it right now. He scoffs, scratching his beard. She motions him over to the couch, scoots over to give him room to sit next to her. Confused, but pliant, he shuffles over, Stranger long gone to his bedroom. She crosses her legs, so she is facing him while he sits with his back against the couch. Her knees are touching his thighs. 

“You don’t have to tell me. But I’m here.” 

“I don’t tell people my shit, you know. They don’t need to hear that.” He begins to try to run his fingers through his hair, but winces. She uncrosses her legs so she can lean forward, and undo it from the bun so he won’t have to reach up as high. When she’s done, she leans down, and realizes his eyes aren’t brown like she thought, more black. 

“I know. I’m just here. If you need it.” She begins to move back to her original position, but finds his hand lightly grasping her waist, urging her to stay close. She keeps eye contact, her breathing slowing down, before he leans his head down, pressing into the crevice between her neck and shoulders. 

“I know.” He says it so quietly that if he hadn’t been right by her ear she didn’t think she would’ve caught it. She wraps her arms around him then, finally feeling his size, and tries to squeeze her newfound calm into him. His arms go from lightly brushing her sides to hugging her back, so desperately that it feels like he is trying to use her weight to stay alive, and soon she finds herself in his lap, one leg on each side of him. 

She closes her eyes and focuses on how grounded she feels in that moment, placing one hand on the back of his head and tangling her hand in his hair. She has known Sandor is large since she met him on the trail, but now she can feel it. Every part of her body is touching a part of him, and it’s just continuous expanse of space and muscle. Then she feels his touch relax, and she mirrors it, relaxing her arms and even her legs, which had been lifting her slightly. As she lowers herself, she finds that they are almost eye level. And as her hand which had been tangled in his hair moves to press against the scarred side of his face, she sees the uncertainty in his eyes. 

And she realizes that whatever happened to Sandor, it hurt him. Greatly. The pain goes so deep in his eyes that she cannot realize it took her this long to notice. It went past the damage to his face, and his attitude. It was deep inside of him, and she briefly wondered how she could ever think his was a silent strength. His strength was in his existence, in his steady, unrelenting power, with no room for other people to doubt him. She also realized that no matter what, he would never make the first move, too afraid to hurt himself and too afraid to hurt other people. 

So she leaned down slowly, moving her hand from his face to behind his neck, breaking eye contact only to look at his lips. She paused for a split second, breathing, and then found him completing the kiss. His lips were softer than she thought they would be, the scar tissue only slightly rougher than normal skin. It ended quickly, the two breaking apart, before she felt his hands on her hips, grounding her, and wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him back in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so! a kiss! an explanation of what happened to Sandor! and what happened to Sansa! wow! lots of stuff happening! also ok ik it might seem ooc for her to go from trauma to make out in a 5 minute span but i promise to trust in the characters and their growth. thank you!!


End file.
